Tony Parsons, the former socialist who now writes for The Sun on Sunday, says we will soon fight out whether Jeremy Corbyn is a “hypocrite or traitor”. Froths Parsons, “Will the lifelong pacifist sport his favoured white poppy on Remembrance Sunday and insult the generations who bought our freedom with their lives? Or will the man who dreams of dismantling the British Army wear a traditional red poppy and betray his deeply held surrender-monkey principles?” Remind me: who’s the hypocrite here? Comrade Parsons, perhaps?
My own preference is the regular red poppy, but I have absolutely no problem or issue with anyone choosing to wear a white poppy. After all, what does the white poppy actually represent? That there are better ways to avoid armed conflict. Whether or not it is a simplistic idea, or a an airy pipe dream, it doesn’t matter. The not so great wars of the 20th century were fought, were they not, with freedom in mind and that, surely, involves the right to choose which poppy you choose to wear. Corbyn, I suspect, will wear the traditional red poppy because he will attend the Cenotaph not just on his own behalf, but on behalf of the Labour Party, past and present. He would get an awful of stick, not just from the gutter press, if he decided to make his own personal point.
It was always going to be like this whoever won the Labour leadership so let’s not pretend the viciousness of the personal attacks on Corbyn would have been spared the likes of Andy Burnham and Yvette Cooper if they had won. The Sun, Rupert Murdoch’s highly politicised attack dog, had already gone after Burnham far more than it went after Corbyn because, I believe, of his work over Hillsborough, not an issue to which the Sun shows any sympathy, rather than the reverse. I appreciate we will never know how the red tops, not to mention the broadsheets like the Times and Telegraph, would have done to the other candidates, would have reacted to anyone else, but come on: look what they did to Kinnock, Brown and Miliband.
To a point, Corbyn is the accidental architect of some of the attacks that are raining down on him. As with John McDonnell’s belated and inadequate apology for his earlier comments about the murderous IRA, he cannot undo the past. I cannot see the relevance of the Sunday Express “story” that Corbyn’s great-great grandfather was a workhouse master back in 1867, nor am I concerned with the Mail’s tittle-tattle front page tosh about an alleged affair he had with Diane Abbott. I am far more concerned about his (lack of) judgement in appointing her to his front bench. More relevant is the fracas about his chairmanship of the Trot-front organisation “Stop The War” and it’s highly disparaging comments about the Royal Family on its website. That is relevant because, once again, it asks questions about his judgement, not least in the sort of company he has kept in the past and still keeps today. Some of the skeletons in his closet are relevant as to his suitability to the top job.
I realise that I am only addressing those within the political bubble who are actively interested in politics and it’s a very small bubble. In the real world, most people are not focused on what Corbyn stands for and whether he is a suitable prime minister, but in the latest ComRes poll, right at the very height of so-called Corbyn-mania, the Tories are on 42% in the polls and Labour are at 30%. Corbyn’s problems will begin once the honeymoon is over and the signs, as he flip flops over Europe in his very first week, are not promising.
Much of the media coverage is of little significance or relevance, but there are still plenty of real questions about Corbyn’s suitability to be a potential prime minister, especially with his political judgement. He is in the box seat now and it is up to him to deal with it. The fact that he has now appointed his own spin machine suggests this might not be the new politics we expected after all.
